The Times of Malta has released the full recordings of businessman Yorgen Fenech’s 2019 police interrogations in which he states that he gave the "OK" to the plot to murder investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. He told police he then gave instructions to “stop everything.”
Caruana Galizia was killed at age 53 in a car bomb on October 16, 2017, as she drove away from her home.
The tapes were played for the nine-member jury that on September 2 acquitted Fenech of complicity in the murder, as well as criminal association. The verdict, decided by an 8-1 vote after about eight hours of deliberation, closed a 55-day trial that exposed a web of contacts between the defendant and Malta’s political elite.
In the 2019 recordings, Fenech admitted to greenlighting the plot with middleman Melvin Theuma. He said Theuma told him his “share” of the cost to carry out the murder would be 120,000 euros, although he did not tell police he paid that amount. He did state that he paid 50,000 euros in an attempt to call off the plot three days after he had approved it.
Theuma was granted immunity from prosecution in exchange for his testimony in the case.
Fenech also said that he provided money to Theuma that was intended to cover the hitmen's expenses after the murder. He told interrogators he kept paying, because he was "scared," and that he was being blackmailed by Theuma, who was a taxi driver by profession.
Throughout the tapes, and his recent trial, Fenech maintained he was merely an intermediary acting on orders from Keith Schembri, the chief of staff to former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat. Schembri, who has not been charged, has strongly denied any involvement.
Before Caruana Galizia was murdered, she had been investigating alleged irregularities surrounding the ElectroGas power station consortium, where Fenech was a director, and 17 Black, his company based in the United Arab Emirates.
While Fenech was cleared of the murder, five other men are serving lengthy prison sentences. They include two brothers who planted and detonated the bomb, as well as two other people who supplied the military-grade explosive.
The shock acquittal of Fenech has reportedly sparked widespread outrage in Malta. Civil society groups Repubblika and Occupy Justice announced that their next vigil for Caruana Galizia — held on the 16th of every month for nearly nine years — will be transformed this month into a mass "protest in solidarity.”
